My name is Chen Mei. I’m 47 years old now and I live in Kejing Town, Jiyuan City, Shandong Province.
On January 8, 2013, as soon as I came out of the education workshop, I went directly to the hillside alone in tears where my son Wei Fei was buried. In the whole afternoon, I let my tears fall down and the hillside echoed with my mournful wail. I felt so sorry for my son, and I felt terribly sorry for my ex-husband as well. I deeply regretted that I was too obsessed with Almighty God in those past years, and was too busy with the “God’s errands” to take good care of my own boy, which resulted in the drowning of my beloved son.
In the winter of 1998, I got married with Wei Min, my classmate from a neighboring village. He worked in a state-owned enterprise in the city. He was so kind, diligent and capable that we did live a good life after we married. In April 2000, our son Wei Fei was born, who brought lots of joys and funs to our little family. In 2004, I opened a lingerie shop. Although I didn’t make much money from it, it did enrich my life. In the spring of 2006, one woman who once bought underwear in my shop tried to introduce Almighty God to me, but I was too busy with my son and business to pay much attention to it.
In early 2007, my husband Wei Min was diagnosed with lung cancer during a physical examination. In the fall of the same year, he left me and our son forever in endless affection. I lost the mainstay of my family and hopes for the future, and was extremely depressed.
Two years later, I was introduced to marry my second husband who was an out-of-town man and worked at a coal mine. After we married, he treated me with considerate caring, and regarded my son Wei Fei as his own. We also had a daughter later. All of these gradually relieved me from sorrow.
One evening in October 2010, life hit me hard again and disrupted my peaceful days: my only elder brother died from a car accident on his way home, so I went back to my parents’ home to look after them for two months. Whenever I saw the sad and dull look on their faces, I could do nothing but hold back my tears and suppress my inner agony.
During that period, the woman who once introduced Almighty God to me came to visit me again. Because I was so afraid that any more misfortune could befall on me or my family, I desperately hoped to find spiritual support and reliance by believing in Almighty God. At the beginning, I only got together with other believers at my house. Later, I started to go to other venues for gatherings, travelling with “brothers and sisters”, chanting and reciting cult heresies, and learning the doctrine of the Almighty God church. Seven or eight months later, I was appointed as the director of a gathering venue.
Once I believed in Almighty God, my mind always fixed on the glorious kingdom of heaven described by the Almighty God church. The more obsessed I became with it, the less I went back home to visit my parents. Furthermore, I completed stopped associating with my relatives and abandoned all my responsibilities for my children by totally leaving them with my husband, which resulted in credibility gap between my husband and me so that we quarreled with each other frequently. I no longer tried to satisfy the needs of my children, constantly went back on my promises to them and cared nothing about my son’s studies. Although I was fully aware of their complains and confusion in their eyes, I thought people who snubbed me or sneered at me were either confused or stupid, because I literally lost myself in serving the Almighty God church and running its errands.
I clearly remembered that it all happened on August 13, 2012. On that day, I was making arrangements of work at a cult gathering, ignoring phone calls from my husband. Soon, a text message was sent in, saying my son run to the Niuwangtan reservoir without permission when unattended at home and got drowned in it. Watching faces of “brothers and sisters” at the gathering, I still chose to stay there until I finished the work arrangements. Later, when I arrived at the site of the accident, I was severely scolded by my relatives, however, I felt unbelievable indifferent inside of me towards my son’s cold body. Until my son’s funeral was finished, I hadn’t even cried once. In the face of complaints and criticism from relatives, the self-inspection that I did was merely focusing on which part I wasn’t devout enough in the pursuit of Almighty God so as to lead to such a tragedy.
In November and December 2012, demanded by the high level of the cult organization, I actively organized “brothers and sisters” from two gathering venues to openly draw in new people and promote the cult teaching. In the middle of the night, we went to the village and shouted slogans such as “It will be dark for three days, and Almighty God will descend to save people”, etc. We also distributed leaflets to nearly every family house before dawn. On December 13, when I was handing out cult propaganda leaflets with “sisters” in a neighboring village, I was reported by local people and then held at a detention center after being arrested. Later, I was transferred to a massed anti-cult education workshop regarding the Almighty God cult.
Through comprehensive and systematic learning, I finally came to my senses and deeply regretted for what I did. I fully realized that Almighty God I once believed in was nothing but heinous false God and devil. Not only did the cult use words to seduce, deceive and bewitch people, but also it exerted despicable means to imprison people’s thoughts and manipulate people’s mind so that victims would be utterly loyal to the cult and do its biddings. In the end, after these brainwashed victims were fully manipulated and controlled, unable to make their own decisions, they would leave their fields uncultivated, give up their possessions and abandon their families, all in all embarking on a path to self-destruction.
Wei Min, I’m so sorry. Please forgive me. I made a promise to you that I would take good care of our son, but I broke my words and let our son die so young. I’ve endured excruciating agonies these days and covered my face with endless tears. My dear Feifei, my sweetheart, it was totally my fault to be so stupid. I was fooled by the Almighty God cult and fell into its clutches. I hate Almighty God for that it destroyed both you and me, and that it made your young life end so early and lie lonely on this hillside. If you had a next life, I would make up to you with my own life.
